NYE Champagne and Cheese Primer

Many of our national holidays are defined by a specific food. Thanksgiving is the turkey holiday. Independence Day is the hot dog holiday. But New Year’s alone is the holiday that is defined by a drink. That drink, of course, is Champagne. Well, let’s say sparkling wine, since we cheese people can certainly sympathize with sensitivities toward the misappropriation of names with protected geographical status. You may be drinking Cava, or Prosecco, or Crémant—technically, none of those are Champagne.

The point of the New Year’s beverage isn’t about where it’s sourced from, though. It’s about what it tastes like. So long as your wine has a good effervescence to it, you’re doing it right. And since there’s so much variation in sparkling wines, there’s naturally going to be variation in which cheeses you want to be pairing with. So we’ve put together this primer as a way of discussing how to do sparkling wine and cheese pairings the right way.

Champagne Cheese Sparkling Wine New Year's Eve Party Celebration

Generally, we can break things down by level of sweetness. Take a look at the label for hints on the sugar content of your vintage. Drier wines will have the word Brut, medium-dry ones will say Seco or Sec, and the sweeter stuff will be denoted by the word Doux or Dolce. We could get into the micro-degrees on this spectrum as well, but we’ll leave that for another time. Let’s focus on those three distinctions.

Brut
If you have a Brut-style wine, you’ll want a cheese that is luscious, soft, and super indulgent. The acidity and effervescence of the wine will work to swashbuckle through the richness of the cheese. The classic pairings here are your triple-cremes: Brillat-Savarin is always a crowd pleaser, as are Delice de Bourgogne and Cremeux de Bourgogne. If you’re looking for something made stateside, New York’s Champlain Valley Triple Cream and Vermont’s Nettle Meadow Kunik are the ways to go.

Seco/Sec
A sparkling wine that is semi-dry wants a cheese that is semi-indulgent. It should still be creamy and rich, but not at such heights as a triple-creme. A Chevre D’Argental would do particularly well with a seco, as would the ever-reliable Camembert Fermier.

Doux/Dolce
Sparkling wines with higher sugar contents are usually fruity and juicy. Therefore, you’ll want a cheese that goes well with sweet, fruity, berry-type flavors. There are plenty of styles that do just that. Valencay is both gooey and fudgy, with a nice bloomy rind to boot, and Taleggio works quite well if you’re looking to bring the funk. If you’re feeling indulgent—and after all, that’s the whole spirit of New Year’s Eve—Cypress Grove’s Truffle Tremor is decadent, tasty, and tasteful.

Bottle Aged/Biodynamic
Now, we did say three categories, but here’s a little bonus info for you. If your sparkling wine happens to be bottle aged, you can try opening up your selection to a broader range of flavors and textures. Bottle aged wines get fermented twice: once in the vat and then once in the bottle. That means they continue to evolve while under the cork. Often this makes for a drink that is funky and unfiltered, much like biodynamic wine. In these cases, the above rules still apply. But you can also do a big blue cheese like the holiday favorite Stilton, or go nuts with something alpine, like Annelies or L’Etivaz.

These are your rules of thumb. Again, no need to over-complicate things for your New Year’s bash—these few guidelines are all you need. Keep it fun, keep it simple, and when in doubt: the creamier the better.

An Egg-cellent Easter Dessert Pairing!

Listen up, because we’re about to turn your world upside down. The last thing we want is for you to go into Easter with the same old meal – that roasted ham, the overly sweet chocolate bunnies, and those sugar-blasted Peeps. So we’re going to up your Easter game with one suggestion: take your cheese plate and turn it into a dessert cheese plate by pairing your best cheeses with some upscale Easter chocolate. We’re going to give you pairings for some of our favorite Easter chocolate (bunnies, eggs, and everything in between) and the cheeses that they would taste awesome with! 

Ah, the classic Easter bunny. There’s no food that is so often associated with Easter as the chocolate bunny. These mischievous bunnies are delectable, but if you’re interested in upping your game, we suggest you break out a log of Capri. This simple, rindless goat’s milk might be on the younger side, but it has a bold, vibrant, and tangy character that makes it clear that this is a spring time cheese. The crumbly, pasteurized goat’s milk is still creamy enough to spread – we say, scoop and spread over a bite of chocolate bunny and go nuts. Want to go crazy with flavor? Throw some raspberries into the mix.

Robin eggs, at least for us, have always been the sign that spring is here. Now, these might not be coming straight from the robin’s nest, but that’s okay. They’re made from decadent milk chocolate caramel ganache that is enrobed in white chocolate, then decorated to look like the real deal. But with a nutty milk chocolate, we’re going to need something creamy, buttery, and utterly delightful. We say, break out the Brillat Savarin. This cheese is basically buttercream icing in cheese form – talk about dessert!

Fresh eggs are a sign that spring has sprung – so how about some delectable chocolate ones? These white chocolate eggs are filled with a milk chocolate hazelnut gianduja mousse – so a nutty Alpine is natural pairing. Our Cavemaster coaxes flavors of roasted hazelnuts, butterscotch, and cocoa out of each wheel of Annelies and the natural nutty flavors are perfect with this chocolate/hazelnut combo. There’s a smooth creaminess in both the egg and the cheese – crunch into both and be taken away on an epic food journey.

Two for the price of one! This carton of eggs is filled with sweet chocolate bliss flavored with two different fillings – sweet ganache of the passion fruit and hazelnut milk chocolate varieties. Inspired by the hazelnut and sweet milk notes, we say break out the Challerhocker for those toasty, nutty eggs. Meanwhile, the passion fruit is just what the doctor ordered when paired with an apricoty, tangy blue cheese like the Bay Blue!